


Unmoored

by quiversarrow



Category: Day6 (Band), K-pop
Genre: Gen, Minor Injuries
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-25
Updated: 2018-07-25
Packaged: 2019-06-15 21:23:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15421878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quiversarrow/pseuds/quiversarrow
Summary: Kim Wonpil is a trainee soldier in a battle training facility called the Dome. He's just gotten his first mission from Central Command to interrogate an enemy soldier, but the process ends up being a little more complicated and treasonous than he could have ever predicted.





	Unmoored

**Author's Note:**

> I said I wanted the Shoot Me MV to be a renegade/rebel AU, but JYP obviously didn't deliver (although I do love the MV that we got), so I took it upon myself to write one as a sort of self-fulfilled fantasy. Stuff can be interpreted romantically, but I didn't make anything super explicit, so y'all can read as you like!
> 
> Just as a disclaimer because I've gotten questions from a few friends: everything in this story apart from the 5 boys is my own world-building. This AU isn't based on a show, but more of a...genre that I wanted to explore, whose most important aspect was that it involved its characters rebelling against a corrupt establishment.

Wonpil doesn’t think of the enemy often. No one does, especially in simulation. All you really think about in that stiff white chair is your screen, and the amount of little red dots that you’ve eliminated with your little white ones. The incessant clamor of numb finger-tapping leaves little room for stray thoughts, much less humanizing the enemy.

Today, however, the enemy is no longer a little red dot. For the first time in his life, Wonpil is fully armed and on a mission from Central Command. He shuffles his feet, his palms sweaty against the grips of his CC-issued handguns, as the doors into the Dome’s main hallway slide closed behind him. Breathing heavily through his nose and trying to remind himself of his training, he walks towards the looming grey door at the end of the hallway.

Some part of him hopes that his card will fail and send him back to the training center, but most of him is glad that things go well. The security guard recognizes him from sparring on Wednesday and, upon the green flash of his card, gives him a curt bow which Wonpil returns with several awkward head-bobs. He then scoots past and hurries down another hallway that narrows until he feels as if he’s shimmying down some giant’s artery.

Finally, he emerges in a grey room. He’s never been in one, of course, but he knows of it; everyone does. It only takes a few midwives’ tales to spread a horror story around the Dome, and with everyone on edge because of the war, it takes even less to convince people of it. Wonpil’s heard of grey rooms filled with corpses, prisoners of war killing themselves with pockets of hidden cyanide pills; he’s heard of grey rooms filled with confiscated bombs and chained enemies, as well as enemies drugged out of their minds, dying slowly. At this point, he imagines that nothing can surprise him.

He is thus extremely bemused when he finds the grey room empty. He strides out of the arterial hallway into the interrogation side of the room, pressing his hands to the bulletproof glass. It’s only then that he spots the grey room’s single prisoner.

The young man slouches in the corner, one arm slung lazily over a raised knee. A pair of battered glasses perches on the tip of his nose, shifting slightly when he reaches a long finger directly through the wire rim to rub his eye.

Wonpil lets him finish before he clears his throat. The man raises his head in slow motion. Once he catches sight of Wonpil, however, his face splits into a huge grin. If that wasn’t enough to knock Wonpil into a state of simultaneous awe and confusion, the string of rapid-fire something that spews out of the prisoner’s mouth is. It takes Wonpil a second to realize that the prisoner is speaking a different language.

“Um,” he says, hoping to clue the foreign enemy in. “Run that by me again?”

The prisoner blinks, his smile fading momentarily, and then smacks the side of his own head. He stands and walks to the glass barrier. Wonpil instinctively takes two steps back at the man’s imposing height and moves his hands towards his guns, but the prisoner only taps his chest.

“Sorry about that. I’m Jae.”

“Jae?”

The man—Jae—nods enthusiastically, his tousled blond hair bouncing along with his head. Wonpil’s hands stray from the guns at his hip. He can’t help but notice that Jae looks nothing like a grey room inmate, or really an enemy at all. He pushes the thought from his mind. It might ruin his hand at simulation; he’s got a pretty good track record that he can’t ruin by accidentally imposing Jae’s smiley face over the red dots.

Trying to ignore Jae’s expectant stare, Wonpil reaches into a pocket of his uniform and retrieves his questions from CC. He’s supposed to be the figure of authority here, but under Jae’s looming height and confusingly delighted reaction to armed interrogation, he feels more than a little out of his depth. He clears his throat, and then, for good measure, clears it again.

“You understand me if I talk like this, right?”

“Yes,” Jae answers. “I may not be fluent, but I manage. Listen—”

“Right,” Wonpil interrupts, not meeting Jae’s eyes. He squints at the paper in his hand and reads aloud. “Where is the secret weapons stash?”

“The what?”

“Don’t tell me you don’t know. I’m not stupid.”

“That’s good. Because I definitely don’t know where or what your mysterious weapons stash is. Haven’t even heard of one.”

Wonpil furrows his brows and skips the question. “How did you get here?”

“In chains.”

“That’s not the question. Did you sneak in?”

“I snuck back in.”

“What does that mean?”

“I escaped and then I came back.”

“But you’re the enemy.”

“There is no enemy. That’s what I need to tell you. You—”

“Why would I listen to a prisoner like you?”

“Why wouldn’t I be telling the truth? I’ve got nowhere to go. I might’ve managed to get back into the Dome, but that’s as far as the plan went. I’m screwed until I get somebody on my side.” His eyes soften when he sees Wonpil’s expression. “I know you’re confused.”

“Confused doesn’t cut it,” Wonpil snorts, still trying in vain to connect the dots. Back into the Dome? No enemy? He’s not sure if Jae just can’t express himself fully, or whether he really knows something that Wonpil doesn’t.

“There’s more at play here than you think,” Jae insists, echoing Wonpil’s thoughts. “I may not know where your weapons stash is, but I do know something about the Dome and its people. I know you’re being duped, every one of you.”

“I don’t understand.”

The ghost of Jae’s previous smile plays on his lips. “I didn’t either. But I’m going to need you to trust me if you want to.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“I need you to. If I don’t get out of here, then this was all for nothing.”

“I don’t care! Why should it matter—?”

“Then shoot me,” Jae interrupts firmly, spreading his arms.

Wonpil sputters to a stop. He suddenly notices how thin Jae is, despite his superior height: how fragile, how small. How human.

“I have some people I need to save,” Jae continues, “and if I can’t get out of this damn gray cage, then I might as well go out with a bang.”

A long pause. Then, Wonpil nods.

“Alright. What do you need me to do?”

“Drop the glass.”

“What?”

“There’s a big red button, isn’t there? I’ll be strapped to the ground, and plus, I wouldn’t hurt you even if I wasn’t.” He reaches into his pocket. “C’mon.”

Wonpil ogles at Jae until the other man’s deadpan expression finally convinces him that he actually means it.

“You’re out of your mind, you know?”

Jae grins. “I’ve been told.”

“The other side must be so tired of you,” Wonpil sighs as he presses the button on the side of the wall, the button that he was told never to press except in the case of an absolute emergency. He hesitates for a second, but then presses anyway. Things have gotten too weird to just set aside as his own paranoia. And Jae’s right—he’ll have the upper hand against a chained opponent. And he’s still got his guns.

He can do this. He needs to find out what’s going on. Things have been weird from the very start: the chicken-scratch mission from CC, on file paper, no less…and CC choosing him, a first-year upper-level simulation trainee, barely two weeks out of lower level, for something like this…

He shakes himself out of his head at the smooth sound of the glass barrier rising into the ceiling. For a moment, he waits for security to ask him for verification, but his radio remains silent. Even more reason to be wary.

He looks up to find Jae very, very secure. Grey bands keep his feet latched to the ground and his arms pulled to the sides. He’s stretched so thin that he looks like he might break if the bands pulled just a little harder.

“Alright, what is it?” Wonpil asks as he nears him, a single handgun raised. He hopes Jae can’t see his hand shaking. He’s not proud of being one of the weakest shooters in his class.

One of Jae’s hands, at that moment closed in a fist, opens. Two small objects drop noiselessly to the ground. Not taking his eyes off Jae, Wonpil drops to his knees and scoops up the objects with the hand that isn’t clinging to his gun.

“….ear plugs??” he asks, bewildered.

“Trust me; you won’t find any in the Dome,” Jae answers with a small smile. “Put them in.”

“This is what you wanted me to do? Risk everything to muffle my hearing? You’re nuts.”

“Thank you.” Jae dips his head, which is as much of a bow as he can manage. He then jerks his chin at the earplugs.

“You’re insane,” Wonpil huffs, but he pops them in.

Of course, he hears nothing. Just the thick, uncomfortable bulk of silicone stuffed into his ears. He’s standing there in the oppressive silence, his face growing redder and redder as he stares into Jae’s smug eyes. He can’t believe that he bought into that blond bandit’s scheme. His mind races. What could Jae really be planning? What is the real point—

Then, suddenly, he finds himself speaking.

“Park Jaehyung.”

Jae’s eyes brighten. He says something, but Wonpil can’t hear him. He can’t hear anything. Images and nonsensical words crawl out of the depths of his mind somehow, through the silicone in his ears, like someone has pushed them to the surface. Six days. Days…my…days? The words had meaning before, and he knows they’re there, just out of reach….

More images flash through his mind, but they’re fleeing from him. He sees a small room, black and white posters on the wall, someone in ripped jeans holding a guitar—a guitar!! It can’t be!! He tries to hold onto the image, but the legs move and there’s a face—a kind face, with gently curled black hair and a dorky, somewhat lopsided smile. An emotion—endearment, maybe—rises in Wonpil’s chest, inexplicably. The face glances down and when he looks up, someone’s ruffling his hair. The dorky boy reaches for the bass that hangs precariously off the second figure’s back before his hand is swatted away. Wonpil blinks, and it’s Jae. Smiling, bright, skinny Jae absentmindedly strumming at a guitar—an electric guitar—that sends great thrums through Wonpil’s skin.

The Jae in his mind starts to blend with the one in front of him and suddenly Wonpil is filled with how viscerally wrong this is, having Jae in bonds, and how could he—

He rips off the earplugs and throws them to the ground, scrambling backwards.

“What did you do to me??” he yells at Jae.

“Me? I didn’t do anything. That’s the sound system.”

“But I—I saw you—you—”

Jae leans forward, at least as much as he can in bonds. “You saw me? But that must mean—”

“How did you get here?” Wonpil demands again, pointing his gun directly at Jae’s chest. “Tell me what’s going on!”

Jae’s excited grin fades. “The Dome is suppressing your memories, buddy. There’s no war. Just some power-hungry dudes and a mindless crowd.”

“Good one. We’ve been fighting for years; the enemy is everywhere. On our simulation screens, the update board, the news feeds…if you’re going to try to fool me, you should aim a little smaller.”

“You saw what I mean! We had a different life before this, and you and I seem to have shared ours.”

“Like I’d trust a prisoner’s word and his sneaky inventions.”

Jae chuckles. “That’s what that CC officer said.”

Wonpil blinks and lowers his gun slightly. He’s finally getting somewhere. “CC officer?”

“Yeah. The guy who vouched for me and put me in this cell so I wouldn’t get myself beaten to a crisp, apparently.”

“What did he look like?

“I dunno. Short hair, kinda—” He makes an upwards motion with his hands. “—like that, brownish? Stocky. Big nose. Big eyes. Gruff voice. Didn’t seem to like me much.”

“He probably thought you were up to no good,” Wonpil notes, though his mind is no longer there. He still doesn’t buy Jae’s ludicrous story, but his interest has moved closer to home: to CC, and specifically to a high-ranking officer known for his rugged authority, harsh accent, and somewhat concerning interest in Dome newcomers.

—

“Officer Park can’t see you right now. He’s busy,” says the desk attendant.

“But—”

She glares at Wonpil and hands the file sheet back to him. “You heard me.”

“But he—”

“Return to your post, soldier,” she interrupts coldly. “I’ll let the officer know you’ve come, and he’ll call for you at a more appropriate time.”

Wonpil opens his mouth to explain again, but the attendant has already brushed him aside, shifting her attention to the next person in line. Huffing under his breath, Wonpil crumples the mission in his hands and stomps towards the door. He’s barely gotten a few steps in when a voice sounds behind him.

“Let him in, Alyssa.”

“Wha—what, sir? You can’t possibly—”

“I’ll speak with him now.”

“But—”

“That’s an order.”

“Y-yes, sir.”

The desk attendant—Alyssa—won’t look at Wonpil as she presses a hand to his back and shoves him none too gently behind the officer, who has turned his back. Wonpil follows, half awed and half bemused, as Officer Park leads him into his study. He stops behind an empty chair as the officer flops into his own and plants his boots on his desk.

“I’ve seen you before,” he says suddenly, cocking his head at Wonpil, who squints back. The man certainly looks the way Jae described him—a little on the stocky side, with hugely expressive eyes, raging eyebrows, and an impressively large nose—but Wonpil’s definitely never met him before. He would remember. Besides, the officer is much younger than he’d ever thought based on what he’d heard of him.

“Do you remember what class I taught you? Was it shooting?”

“Um….no, sir. We haven’t met.”

Officer Park’s brow furrows. “Oh? That’s odd. I could have sworn I’ve met you before. Ah, well. Must be that I’m getting old.”

“You’re not much older than me, sir.”

“Who told you my age?”

“It’s on the plaque above your desk, sir.”

“Ah, yes. That’s new. I wasn’t expecting them to promote me, see. And at this rate…” He sighs heavily, grabbing a shiny new pen and spinning it in his fingers. “I sort of wish I hadn’t been.”

“What?”

“Ah. Nothing. What mission were you talking about?”

“I—I received one yesterday to interrogate a prisoner in Room 101A—”

“Room 101A?” Officer Park’s boots are off his desk immediately; he’s suddenly standing. “Who gave you that order?”

Wonpil shrinks back. “Brian Kang said—”

“Ah.” Officer Park sits down again, entwining his fingers, and Wonpil lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “I should have guessed. That man is in the blue room too often to want to go there again.”

“You sent that order? To Brian? Do you know him?”

“I might have sent the order, but I certainly don’t know him,” Officer Park laughs. “Never even seen the man. But his knowledge of the enemy language is infamous, and lower lev officers are always telling me that he’s up to some mischief.”

“Sleeping in simulation, more like.”

“Is that what he does? If he didn’t work under me, I might consider him a legend. Well….I suppose this Brian Kang passed his mission along to you.”

“I guess so, sir,” Wonpil answers through gritted teeth. Brian! Why he even considers the man his best friend is beyond him. Brian’s nonchalance at all kinds of trouble—sleeping in class and humming songs other than the Dome anthem being the most common of his crimes—has gotten Wonpil into a number of sticky spots, but he’s always managed to avoid the blue room. Brian’s been there enough times to write a small book about it, though, and even though Wonpil never imagined that it could get to his head, he supposes that there are some punishments even the most at ease of sparring partners can’t best.

“Well then. I suppose I’ll have to catch you both up on the situation, then,” says Officer Park, shaking Wonpil out of his thoughts.

“Good luck convincing him to come, sir. He hates CC.”

“Ah, don’t worry. I can handle a wayward soldier,” Officer Park replies cheerily, reaching across his desk to grab what looks like a landline phone. He dials something too short to be a number for anything and brings it to his ear.

“Hello? Yes, this is Central Command Officer Park Sungjin, Level 42. I want Soldier Brian Kang, Level 15, brought to my study immediately. By any means necessary, yes, but I do want him alive. No, preferably easily rendered conscious. Thank you.”

He turns back and grins at Wonpil’s dropped jaw.

“…sir?”

“Pull yourself together, soldier. We’ve got a situation to tackle. And by the way, please call me Sungjin. I’ll feel less old that way.”

—

Wonpil isn’t sure what surprises him more: finding out that Sungjin wants him to commit high treason, agreeing to said treason, or discovering that Brian Kang reacts to leftover pizza like a smelling salt. At any rate, he pinches himself several times as he follows Sungjin down the familiar arterial hallway.

“Why are you doing that?” Brian snaps from behind him. “You’re not the one recovering from an actual injury.”

Wonpil jumps in surprise—he’d forgotten that Sungjin had cheerfully threatened his friend into coming along. He turns and winces as Brian rubs the bruise on his forehead where the lower lev officer had knocked him silly.

“Just…not how I thought I’d be spending my Friday afternoon,” Wonpil admits. “You know, casually breaking every Dome rule possible with a high-lev CC officer.”

“What, you’d rather go to simulation?”

“I know you wouldn’t. But I’m not you.”

Brian side-eyes him. “Don’t tell me you enjoy sitting in that chair, tapping away until your fingers bleed. It’s an obvious waste of time. Why can’t they just assign a few of us to do it? Why do they need an entire three classes of upper and lower lev trainees, plus another class of actualized soldiers?”

“I don’t know,” Wonpil says, shrugging. “But if you don’t go, you get blue room and half rations. You’d know. Is it really worth it?”

“I don’t do it on purpose,” Brian grumbles.

“Oh, really?”

“Really,” Brian says, his tone low. “Why the hell would I lie about that?”

“No idea,” Wonpil laughs. “Why do you do anything?” He waits for Brian to mockingly repeat his words, or to even chuckle under his breath, but for once Brian is dead serious.

“I’m no troublemaker, Wonpil. Just a kid with bad luck.”

Wonpil blinks and then sighs. “Okay, fine. I’ll take your word for it. But you should at least try to stay awake.”

“That was only a few times! I’m talking about the rest. The humming. I don’t do it on purpose; it just…” He gestures vaguely and then shakes his head. “I don’t know. It must be instinctual. But it keeps getting me thrown into the blue room, sometimes by myself, and…wow. You don’t know what that place feels like.”

“I’d rather not, either.”

“Yeah. That’s a good mindset to keep.”

They drift into silence as Sungjin leads them into the grey room. Wonpil’s glad to see that he remembered to reset the glass barrier, or at least that the security guard checked in after he bolted the day before. He’s also more than happy to let Sungjin do the talking with Jae, who has already sidled up to the glass from his customary corner.

“Hello again,” he says to Sungjin, smiling as usual. “We’re pretty populous today. What’s the special occasion?”

“Yesterday I had one of these soldiers ask you a few questions. Do you remember them?”

“Of course. My memory isn’t that whack.”

“Good. Just thought I’d make sure. You can’t be too careful these days.”

“That’s for certain, my friend.”

“Friend?” whispers Brian to Wonpil. “Since when are these two friends?”

“Since when has there been no enemy?”

“Since the very beginning, supposedly,” Brian whispers back with a wry smile. “If you don’t have an enemy for the people to fight, make one up.”

“You really believe it, though?”

“Over the bullshit CC feeds us everyday? Sure. Why wouldn’t I doubt a system that says that if you sleep for a minute in sim, it’s blue room for three days, plus half rations, which are more like quarter rations? And if you sing a song that isn’t the Dome anthem, it’s blue room for two days, half rations? Get a lyric wrong in the anthem? Blue room, two days, half rations. Miss a class? Probably never see the light again. Honestly, if anyone’s doing us dirty, it’s the higher levs.”

“What a burn,” Jae calls from behind the glass. Brian glares at him.

“That was a whisper.”

“Yeah, a loud one.”

“I’m a loud person.”

“Glad to hear it,” Jae says, grinning. He turns to Sungjin and points at Brian. “Who’s that one? I like him.”

“That one’s going to ask you about the weapons stash again.”

“Yep. Where and what is it?” asks Brian in what is probably the most monotone voice he can muster.

Sungjin sighs and adds, “We know there is one. The higher levs talk about it all the time in their meetings.”

“Their meetings?” Wonpil repeats.

“Level 42 is high, but not high enough to be privy to the details,” Sungjin responds with a shrug, “so I eavesdrop.”

“Eavesdrop?? On higher levs?”

“You’re more of a boss than I thought,” Brian muses.

“Thank you.” Sungjin beams before his face darkens again. He turns back to Jae. “I acknowledge that you’re no enemy. I believe you when you say you were once one of us, and that you escaped and came back after regaining some of your memories. But I also trust that you wouldn’t have come back here without some idea of how to defeat the real enemy, and that would involve—”

“Your so-called weapons stash,” Jae finishes. He smiles and taps the side of his head; Wonpil gets a vague sense of deja vu. “Korean’s not the best. I don’t know what a weapons stash is. But I do know what you need to stop the enemy.”

“And what’s that?”

“Instruments, buddy. Real-life, real-illegal instruments! Get ready, boys; we’re re-starting a band!” he exclaims, punching the air. He’d probably try to punch it again if Sungjin didn’t hold up a hand.

“Not so fast, trigger-happy. What do we need instruments for?”

“What else?” Jae demands. “To drown out the buzzing, of course!”

“What buzzing?” Sungjin snaps back. Jae’s delighted smile falters and then morphs into shock.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Do I look like I’m kidding?” Sungjin growls. Jae holds up his hands.

“Okay, okay. No kidding here. But seriously, where did you think the memory suppression was coming from?”

“I didn’t.”

“What?”

“My job isn’t to think about the intricacies of the higher levs’ plans,” Sungjin says in a low tone. “My duty as an officer is to make sure that the people are protected. All I know now is that they aren’t. The higher levs have admitted to taking advantage of our people, and have talked about how their plans are working spiffingly. Only the secret weapons stash can foil them, and it’s apparently been hidden away so thoroughly that no one can find it.”

“Okay, number one, who the hell says spiffingly? Number two—”

“I do.”

“…okay, fair. But more importantly, the reason that you—we—have all been losing our memories is because the higher levs have broken into the sound system.This place must have been meant as some kind of theater before it was made into the Dome. It’s got some pretty impressive boom systems, capable of broadcasting super loud sounds all the way around the building.”

“And someone’s programmed in a memory loss buzz?” Wonpil demands. “Are we really supposed to believe that?”

“Don’t you? Why do you think those earplugs worked? Why do you think you knew my name?”

“I know your name because you told me.”

“No. My full name. But you’ve forgotten it now, right?”

Wonpil’s already wracking his brain. Jae’s full name? Since when did he know…wait. He said it aloud when he caught those images! But he can’t remember any of them, much less the words that came with them. When he tries, all he can retrieve is a horrible whirring noise that shoots a lance of white pain through his brain.

“Ow!”

“It hurts because the sound is still there, trying to stop you from remembering,” Jae explains. “Now that you know it’s there, you can probably hear it.”

It’s true. Now that he’s picked it up, Wonpil can’t get it out of his head. Even when he thinks of other things, the whirring continues. It sets his teeth on edge. He can’t believe he’s never noticed it.

“So that’s what’s in the blue room,” Brian pipes, shaking Wonpil out of his horror. Sungjin whirls on him.

“There isn’t anything in the blue room. It’s pure isolation, as it should be. The worst punishment.”

“That’s not the worst punishment. You’ve never been in there. It’s like getting your brains ripped out. You sit in a hazy fog and something’s wrong, but you can’t pin it down and it literally tears you apart. When they finally open the door and you stumble back into the real world, it’s all you can do to haphazardly shove your broken parts back together when you walk back into your own brain.”

“That’s awful,” Wonpil whispers, turning to Sungjin. “You really do that to them?”

“Not me,” he responds, cold. “It’s supposed to be isolation, but the higher levs must know better. They glory in it.”

Wonpil’s suddenly glad that out of all the people he could be committing treason with, it’s Park Sungjin. There’s an icy threat in his tone that chills Wonpil’s blood. Someone once told him that they called Officer Park the Protector of the People. He’d laughed it off then, but now he finds himself believing it.

“Well. Instruments,” Sungjin muses, before turning back to Jae. “That’s that, then. Where are they?”

“No clue, bro.”

“No clue??” Wonpil yelps. “Offic—Sungjin…?”

“Of course,” Sungjin sighs, letting out a clipped laugh. “Should have guessed that the prisoner would only be so helpful.”

“Took me long enough to figure out that the Dome even had instruments,” Jae snaps. “You expect me to give you a map to exactly where?”

“That would be nice,” Wonpil says dryly.

“Think I can help with that,” Brian butts in. He stares at Jae so hard that the latter actually takes a step backwards despite his superior height. “I know a bit of an eccentric kid who claims that he’s been playing a drum set after class. Face of an angel, head up…somewhere, but if he’s been able to locate one illegal instrument he might be able to lead us to the rest. I mean—” He rolls his eyes in Sungjin’s direction. “—it is a stash, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Great, then let’s go. We’ve got some treason to commit.”

“And if your kid succeeds, you let me out, right?” Jae demands. “I gave you all this information. And plus, I can play the hell out of an electric guitar.”

Wonpil winces at the mention of the guitar, and then turns away to hide his discomfort. He’s not supposed to be afraid of illegal music anymore; he’s a renegade now!

Sungjin pats his arm, clearly misinterpreting his shudder. “No worries, soldier. I’ll think long and hard before I let blondie out of there.”

—

Yoon Dowoon is, as Brian warned, a character.

If Sungjin’s accent was a struggle to follow, Dowoon’s is on a whole different level. At first, Wonpil is certain that the strategics trainee speaks an entirely different language. Eventually, however, he catches up to Dowoon’s speech pattern and ascertains that yes, the man speaks Korean, but with such a low tone and lilting inflection that he radiates constant astonishment.

That very Dowoon now sits across from Brian and Wonpil with a sort of dopey but endearing smile plastered on his face. Wonpil can’t help but think that this grinning trainee would get along just fine with smiley grey room Jae. He can’t believe how many smiley, strangely friendly people he’s met in the last day, but decides not to question it too much.

“You did hear what I said, right?” Brian is asking Dowoon. “If you do this for us, you’ll be committing high treason.”

“Sure,” answers Dowoon.

Wonpil and Brian look at each other. While Wonpil is close to his wit’s end, Brian looks like he’s trying his best not to laugh. He brushes the hair out of his face and stands.

“Okay. So you want to show us where your hidden drum set is?”

“I can take you to the hallway.”

“What about after that?” Wonpil demands. Dowoon shrugs as he moves after Brian. He’s taller than Wonpil imagined for someone who Brian stubbornly insists on calling a kid.

“I can’t remember what happens after that. But it’s okay. I’ll get us there.”

On that encouraging note, he overtakes Brian, pushes open the door, and almost stomps over Sungjin. The officer blinks as Dowoon pinwheels his arms for balance and then begins a flurry of bowing and nonsensical apology. Brian and Wonpil come up behind them, the former’s shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter.

“I would have warned you,” he finally manages once he can squeeze out words.

Dowoon’s still staring at Sungjin. Finally, he points at him.

“I know you.”

“You probably do, soldier.”

Dowoon seems to wrestle with his brain for a moment before he says, “You’re the Protector of the People.”

Sungjin blinks. “The what?”

“It’s what the lower levs call you,” Wonpil mutters. “He means it as a compliment.”

“I wasn’t going to take it as anything less, though I wonder what I did to deserve it.”

“Higher levs never care about what goes on down here,” Dowoon says. “But you do. My level 20 friends still remember when you increased their rations without CC certification. You’re a hero, sir.”

“I’m a normal human being. You can’t call decency heroism.” Sungjin glances at Wonpil and Brian. “Nor should you call it treason. Let’s just say we’re doing some good, for once.” He pats Dowoon’s shoulder and gestures down the dimly lit hallway. “Now where to?”

—

Things go smoothly until, well, Dowoon’s memory cuts off. He takes them to the very end of a hallway just a few turns from the one that leads to Jae’s grey room, and, at least according to Brian’s growing list of high-octave concerns, the blue room. Then, he stops.

“This is it?” Sungjin asks.

Dowoon points. “There’s a guard there. I don’t remember him. But the drums are around here somewhere.”

“What do you usually do once you get here?”

“I don’t remember.”

“Alright, then,” Sungjin says slowly. His tone is calm, but Wonpil can hear a thin thread of impatience in his voice. “So what would you do now, if we weren’t here?”

Dowoon cocks his head and points again. “I’d wander over there, tell him I’m lost. Ask him if I can just take a peek in the room. Tell him I won’t even go in.”

“And then you’d just…go in?” Wonpil asks in disbelief. Dowoon shrugs.

“I don’t remember anything about this place. If I don’t remember, why wouldn’t the guard be the same?”

“A little assumptive, but he’s got a point,” Brian mutters. He starts to move forwards, but Sungjin yanks him back.

“What are you doing, soldier?” he demands. “We need a plan!”

“Why?” Brian shoots back. “We’re just gonna forget it. We should just play it by ear and hope for the best.”

“And if that doesn’t work?”

“Well, it’s death or blue room,” Brian snaps, bitterness seeping into his voice. “I’ve been threatened with both, and know a whole lot about one. Can’t get any worse, right?”

“Maybe not for you or me, but these two have never done anything like this. You really want to involve them in your mess?” Sungjin retorts. Wonpil’s heart surges into his throat, wanting to defend himself, but his rational side forces him to back down. Sungjin is right. He’s fresh out of the training center, with all of his experience in battle being sim-based. He can’t imagine handling the blue room, much less a death threat.

Brian’s eyes dart to Wonpil, linger on him, and then land on Dowoon, who’s shuffling his feet. His expression softens and he lifts his hands in surrender. “Fine. What’s the plan then, boss?”

“Sir.”

“Sir then, boss.”

Sungjin sighs through his teeth and then narrows his eyes as he returns his attention to the guard who’s pacing in front of the steel double doors. Next to the doors on the wall is a small black box, and swinging at the guard’s hip is a small green card in a plastic cover. It slips in and out of view every time he turns.

“You said you’d just ask, hm?” Sungjin asks Dowoon.

“Yeah.”

“But that only works if you’re one person. We could just send you, of course, but then we’d never get to see the instruments for ourselves. You’re a good kid, but you still might be lying. No offense.”

“None taken,” Dowoon replies.

“So there’s four of us: one officer, three trainees…” Sungjin starts.

“You could be taking us somewhere, like for a class,” Wonpil suggests. “Maybe a bonding exercise?”

“Me? A bonding exercise? That guard is Lee Taejoon, Level 26. I taught him for three years. He knows I’m not one for a bonding exercise. More likely I’d be taking you on a run of shame.”

“Then make it a run of shame,” Brian snaps. “I’ve been humming again, and this time I’m doing it on purpose. You’re showing me the works, how music ruins people. I pulled him into it.” He gestures at Dowoon. “Mr. Strategics? He’s been doing my planning, helping me escape this hellhole. I’m fed up with it. You keep chucking me in the blue room, but I keep coming back. All you’re doing is taking these three misfits into the weapons room for a little brush with reality.”

“Just a few inches from the truth is the best kind of lie,” Dowoon intones as he pats Brian’s back. Brian brushes him off.

“Why are you patting me?”

“I’m your planner.”

Brian laughs. “You’re not actually, though. I thought of that one myself.”

“Because you hang out with me.”

“Ha, okay. I’ll let you have that one, kid,” he chuckles, before turning to Sungjin. “So what do you think, boss? Care to start a fight?”

Sungjin sighs and pushes back his hair. “Your fight is on, soldier. But don’t push it too far. I do like you.”

—

It’s not the first time that Sungjin’s been authoritative, but it is the first time Wonpil shudders at his voice. The officer has one hand clamped to the collar of Brian’s uniform, dragging him, and the other pulls Dowoon by the the back of his shirt to the point where he looks comically childish. Wonpil hurries after them, and doesn’t need Sungjin’s growling order to cower like he’s really being punished.

“Sir!” Lee Taejoon shouts, standing to attention. “What’s going on?”

Brian sputters a few of his practiced lines, but Sungjin barks over him.

“What does it look like, soldier? These three have misbehaved long enough. I’m teaching them a lesson. Open the damned door.”

“But sir—the higher levs—”

“You know who this man is?” Sungjin demands, shaking Brian by his collar.

“I’m going to cut this place to bits, you son of a—” Brian spits, before coughing as Sungjin shakes him again.

“Quiet! Do you, Lee?”

“Yes, sir. That’s Brian Kang, sir. The hummer. But he’s only a trainee—”

“And you know what trainees become?” Sungjin hisses. A chill crawls down Wonpil’s spine even though he knows it’s all acting. Taejoon balks.

“Sir—”

“They become soldiers, son. They fight for our cause. They work under me, under you. You point one way and they’re supposed to go, guns raised. What can we do with a dissenting trainee to make them understand what it is that we fight for?”

“Prove to them that they’re wrong,” Taejoon stammers. “But this room…it’s much too dangerous, sir. The higher levs told us so.”

“No amount of danger is frightening to the non-believer. Open the door, son, or I call backup.”

Taejoon’s eyes dart from Sungjin’s steely expression, to Dowoon’s meek look, to Wonpil and his pounding heart, and then finally to Brian, who puts up a last fight with a string of curses and insults that finally send Taejoon’s hand to the card at his hip.

“I still don’t know about this, sir…” he says to Sungjin as they pass him. “You can’t always change people like that.”

“Then I’ll change your mind,” Sungjin says firmly. “Been doing that for the last five years.” He grabs Taejoon’s hands and squeezes them. “Make sure no one comes in to bother us.”

—

They’re all huddled against the closed double doors in the dark, afraid to venture farther in. Wonpil can almost feel the questions seething in Brian’s brain: the _so when does it get hazy_ and _will it hurt like it always does_ and _will I ever be able to eat good food again_ buzzing just under his calm exterior. He tries not to listen to his own racing heart, the roar of confusion in his own ears.

“Did you actually have backup?” Brian whispers.

“Of course not,” Sungjin snaps back, the tension high in his voice. “But Taejoon and all those like him are deathly afraid of it.”

“It’s a last resort,” Brian realizes. “Ah.”

Sungjin laughs with no humor. “Get out.”

“I would, but the guard might have something to say about that.”

Sungjin heaves a breath that fills the darkness around them, taking Wonpil’s attention away from the conversation for the moment. He squints, trying to assign names to the shadowy shapes hunkering around them, but his brain is already growing fuzzy.

“Does this place have any light?” he demands. “We need to see.”

“Can Taejoon hear us?” Brian’s voice pipes from beside him. Wonpil’s never heard it sound so small. He wants to press a comforting arm to his friend’s back when something rattles beside him. A swathe of dim but functional blue light sweeps the room. He turns on his heel and comes face to face with Dowoon, who’s holding a small pocket flashlight on a silver keychain.

“Knew I’d need it,” he explains simply when the rest of them ogle at him. “Just didn’t know why.”

“Well done, soldier,” Sungjin says after a pause, before looking over his shoulder. “And in answer to you, Brian, this place is perfectly soundproof. Feel the wall. See how it springs? That’s noise isolation foam. I imagine the higher levs don’t want anyone knowing about their little collection.”

He gestures in front of them, but Wonpil doesn’t need him to. He’s already looking, already staring in amazement at the assortment of instruments before him. There’s a drum set, of course, where Dowoon has already made himself at home. But the drum isn’t all the room has to offer. For one, there are guitars! A pristine white and gold electric guitar and a red one, plus a few acoustic guitars whose golden varnish looks green under Dowoon’s blue light. A black bass guitar leans against the wall like a king, and beside it…

Wonpil blinks. Something about the keyboard is achingly familiar. His fingers brush the keys and suddenly his head hurts, every cell in his brain trying to crawl through the fog and reach for something straining in the back of his mind. He leans down, holding his head, and almost bumps into Brian, who has a faraway look in his eyes as he slings the strap of the bass over his shoulder.

“This is how it should be,” he mutters. “I don’t know how or why, but this is right.”

“Nothing about this is right!” Wonpil retorts, even though Brian’s only talking to himself and he knows it. His head burns. He’s on the verge of unearthing something about his past, but he’s afraid of it. What will he become when he comes out of this? “We shouldn’t feel anything towards this stuff. It’s dangerous! It’s—”

A booming drumbeat swallows his thought. Wonpil’s never had an out-of-body experience, nor has he ever wanted to, but he can’t describe the feeling that Dowoon’s first beat gives him as anything less. He splits in two, a brain and body, fear and endless, overwhelming curiosity…and the sense that Brian was talking about, the sense that he didn’t want to admit but does now. This is right. Something about this situation—these beautiful instruments in a prison vault—is absolutely right and pure and Wonpil thinks he might be crying when his fingers respond.

He plays.

He plays the keyboard and somehow knows how to do it. A great bliss shudders through his fingers as if they’ve reconnected with a long-lost limb. Beside him, the low tones of Brian’s bass join the lilting notes that flow out of his keyboard. He’s trying to express his shock and inexplicable joy when Sungjin strums one of the acoustic guitars and he forgets about it entirely.

Wonpil doesn’t know exactly when they stop playing. He barely remembers their names. The fog in his brain has cut off everything except the way that his keys sound when they dip under his fingers, and once that’s gone he can only stand there in blank shock. He turns to Brian and they blink confusion at each other.

“Dowoon,” Sungjin says, his voice hoarse. “Give us a beat, please.”

“Why?” Dowoon asks. He spins his drum stick ever so slowly and stares hazy eyes at all of them. “I think it’s time for us to go home.”

“Just do it.”

A pause, and then Dowoon moves. The first beat knocks their names back into Wonpil’s head, and the next two the reasons why they’re there.

Instruments.

Weapons, as Jae said.

Sungjin echoes Wonpil’s thoughts. “I think we have a few more questions for our trusty blond.”

—

“You played them??” Jae demands a day later, pressing his hands to the glass as he stares at the mismatched group that has collected in the interrogation section of his grey room.

“You said you had some friends to save,” Wonpil says, dodging the question. He’s uncomfortable next to Alyssa the desk attendant, who, it turns out, is a graduate from combat training and Sungjin’s personal bodyguard. But, since Sungjin insists that she’s the only person they can trust in the entirety of CC, he pushes his nerves down. “Then you told us you planned to re-start a band. What did you mean?”

“Us, clearly,” Jae replies, his gleaming eyes lingering on each of them. “I should have guessed! I did almost guess, when you told me about what you saw after you muffled the buzz. I wasn’t sure though. But now!” He claps. “Now we’re getting somewhere.”

“Not yet,” Sungjin says coolly, stepping forward. “We need you to prove that you’re useful.”

“What—”

“Alyssa.”

“Yes, sir.”

Wonpil jumps nearly two feet back as the woman he’d previously thought was a simple desk attendant whips a gun out from under her uniform and shoots twice above their heads. Something ashen falls to the ground, and when Wonpil prods it with his heel he recognizes it as the side of a camera. His blood freezes as he thinks about all the things that CC may have heard, but Sungjin seems unconcerned.

“No whats,” he continues in Jae’s astonished face. “I’m staking our escape on you, since you’ve gotten out of here before. But that’s not important, at least for now. What’s important is that you tell us exactly how you plan to make a bunch of band instruments block out the sound of a memory wipe.”

“Simple,” Jae responds with a smirk. “We use their own machine against them. If you let me out, I’ll gladly show you.”

“Gladly,” Wonpil repeats under his breath, but Sungjin and Alyssa have already looked at each other and begun to move forward. Brian and Dowoon lean against the wall in irritating nonchalance. Wonpil tries to speak to them with his eyes, but Brian just rolls his.

“What are you still afraid of?” he drawls. “If all of this ends badly, it’s either die for treason or live in prison. Either way, it sucks. The most harm Jae can do is add some intrigue to the madness, and frankly I’d say that’s worth it.”

“You’re insane.”

Brian cocks his head. “Aren’t you, too? You’re still here.”

—

Somehow, the glass made Jae feel smaller. Now that’s he’s out, Wonpil wonders if the man is somehow related to redwood trees. He’s never felt so small next to such a thin person, especially one who makes the desk attendant’s uniform he wears as a disguise look like it was made for a bodybuilder with stub legs. Jae’s bounding and seal-clapping and prattling on in his distinctly foreign accent only fuels his larger-than-life presence.

Wonpil can’t help but like him, though, even if he can’t yet bring himself to trust him. Everything about the man just oozes genuineness. Even his lies feel humorous, light, infused with tiny matches of truth.

It’s because of this that Wonpil believes him when he explains his past. His memory never came back completely, even after he left the Dome. Day6—the name of their band, apparently—came back to him in bits and pieces while he was still a trainee in simulation, and eventually he stopped going to sims because the buzzing was too intense there. After he escaped, he went back to Day6’s company—because the band was under a company, he tells them—and tried to figure out why they might have all ended up in the Dome.

“Probably because we were near here for tour, or something,” he says with a shrug. “I could only gather that the Dome was picking people up and taking them inside for training purposes.”

“Except we never came out,” Brian supplies. Jae nods.

“Because we were brainwashed into thinking that we needed to fight. But, at least as far as I can tell, there isn’t an enemy. It’s just a normal world out there, doing normal things, having no idea that a place like the Dome exists.”

“We’re like a cult,” Dowoon muses.

“Sure,” Jae laughs. “Maybe a bit like a cult. A religious cult built around a fake war.”

“You sure it’s near here?” Sungjin butts in from the front of their small line. They’ve managed to get past most of the guards and early morning passersby by resembling two different groups—one with Alyssa and Jae, the desk attendants, and another with Sungjin and his unruly disciples—but now that they’re nearing the instrument stash they’ve huddled together again.

“Positive. I’ve done this before, you know.”

“Yes, but that was months ago. Things have changed. And besides, you only needed to cover the buzzing long enough for yourself to get out. We have five people, six if you count Alyssa.”

“I’m coming, sir,” Alyssa snaps. “You think I’d survive the backlash of all of this without you?”

“Fair. And that furthers my point. It’s unlikely that CC hasn’t noticed our little adventures, or at least guessed that something is up. I’m not the kind of officer to easily avoid rumors.”

“A boss,” Brian mutters.

“A target,” Sungjin corrects him. “I don’t imagine—ah, of course.”

They’ve entered the hallway that leads to the double doors, and it’s unsettlingly empty. Jae scratches his head.

“It’s not supposed to look like this, is it? Back in my day…”

“…there were a dozen guards. Yesterday we had one,” Sungjin finishes. “There’s no point in furiously guarding a place that people either fear or don’t remember.”

“But there should be at least one,” Alyssa whispers, her hand reaching for her gun again. “Why do I feel like we’re being watched?”

“Because we probably are. I’m willing to bet half my levels that Taejoon ratted us out. I’m not the only good teacher he’s had. We’ve got to move quickly.”

“But if they’re after us, why haven’t we gotten a message? Why aren’t they staking us out?”

“How could they, if we haven’t done anything ostensibly wrong yet? There aren’t any cameras in the instrument room—no need, if there aren’t any lights.”

“They have our conversations from the grey room, though,” Wonpil says. “We didn’t shoot out those cameras until it was too late. They know that we’re aware of the buzzing, the instrument room, the weapons…”

“All they know is that we listened,” Sungjin insists. “They know we humored Jae.”

“And by now they know he’s gone.”

“But they don’t know anything more, so what they’re doing is waiting, waiting for us to trip and stumble into the spotlight. Which is why we need to move quickly. Jae—Jae! Where are you—?”

Wonpil stifles a yelp as Jae seems to vanish. At Sungjin’s question, however, he ducks his head back into the hallway and Wonpil finally sees the door that he entered. It’s so small and tucked away so neatly that he would never have seen it had Jae not tried to maneuver his spindly giant’s stature into it.

“This way,” Jae calls as if everything is perfectly fine.

Sungjin gestures for the trainees to go first. Wonpil lets Dowoon and Brian climb over the small step before he does. He stoops under a sudden overhang and then emerges in a large room with pastel blue walls.

Brian stumbled backwards as if he’s seen a ghost. “No. No.”

“What?” Jae asks over his shoulder as Brian nearly trips over Sungjin on his way back to the door. Wonpil reaches for his arm, but Brian dodges it.

“You’re not tricking me back in there. No.”

“This isn’t the blue room, Brian,” Sungjin says gently. “It just shares a wall. We’re behind it.”

“I’m not going back. It drove me crazy, you understand? You know what it’s like to—to—” His hands tremble and reach for his hair, tousling it. “I can feel it in my brain again. You don’t need to show me this. I’m out. I’m out.”

“Brian—”

“I’m out!”

“Brian, look!”

Brian, inches from crawling back through the door, freezes at Dowoon’s booming voice. He turns as if pulled by a string and follows Dowoon’s outstretched arm, to his pointing finger, to the huge black machine that whirs and grates like some ancient monster crafted of gears and steel against the back wall.

“What. Is that?” Brian demands, punctuating each word like Dowoon has somehow wrenched it out of him.

“I don’t know,” Dowoon responds serenely before gesturing at Jae. “But I think he does.”

Jae has walked up to the machine and knelt in front of it, searching for something. His hands trace the hundreds of speaker dots that pepper the metal until he finally smiles and pulls. Immediately, the whirring in the back of Wonpil’s brain lessens. It’s a marginal decrease, but noticeable enough that he finds himself pressing a finger to the back of his head, where part of him is surprised that there isn’t a hole.

Jae turns to the rest of them and opens his palm. Sitting in its center is a tiny grey box pocked with smaller versions of the speaker dots on the black machine. What looks like an innocent USB cable pokes out of its top, with a corresponding empty port gleaming in the wall’s machine.

“What is that?” Brian asks again. Jae pockets the device.

“Amplifier,” he says.

“Which does what?”

“Exactly what it sounds like. It amplifies the buzzing. The last time I did this, the thing was huge, and much stronger than this one.” He frowns. “They must have thought it unnecessary to have one so large. That might be a problem if we’re really gonna broadcast a song.”

“We’re doing what now?” Wonpil splutters. He can’t play any songs! Where is he supposed to learn how to play a song? Whatever magic happened yesterday in the instrument room was a stroke of luck, a miracle. It didn’t mean he could play songs, that he can play one now!

Jae continues as if he hasn’t just stated the impossible. “Last time I did this, I broadcasted a single note. Rubber band on my thumb, recorded and repeated on my mission communicator. With the old amplifier, that was enough. But this one…we’re gonna need one hell of a song to beat out this machine.”

“I’ve got one, maybe a couple,” Brian says grimly. When Wonpil whirls on him, he sighs and taps his head. “In here.”

“But that’s danger—”

“Dangerous? We’re in a blue room. I’ll happily play something loud and illegal to make sure that I never come here again.”

“Good. We’ll need that bass,” says Jae. He’s already heading out of the room. Wonpil hurries after him.

“How do you know that he plays that? I thought you lost your memories!”

“I lost most of them. But I’ve stayed with you guys long enough to learn your names, and with them I’ve been able to pair you with the members in my head. You play the keyboard, don’t you?”

Wonpil gapes at him until he laughs and pats his arm.

“I know you’re scared. You and I were both in sim and that’s the hardest one to shake. They broadcast the buzzing straight into our headsets, you know.” He glances at Wonpil, seeming to expect some response, but Wonpil has none. He just stares some more until Jae picks up his own conversation.

“I used to like to pretend that we didn’t get along, back in the real world. But just between you and me as we are now, Wonpil, I think you’re a real musician. You write, you sing, you play the keyboard. You hard carry our team.” He smiles. “But don’t remember I said that, okay?”

With that, he climbs through the door, leaving Wonpil baffled behind him.

—

Alyssa takes up Lee Taejoon’s job as the guard; the rest of the group marches inside the instrument room with drawn shoulders and tight lips. Even Jae’s normally bright demeanor dims once the double doors slam behind them and cloak them in darkness. He only speaks to compliment Dowoon’s blue flashlight, before he retrieves the red electric guitar from the ground and slings it over his chest.

“Dowoon,” Sungjin growls. This time he doesn’t need to elaborate; Dowoon sends a beat reverberating around the room and then settles into a simple but effective rhythm.

Jae rubs his head. “Smart. You figure that out the last time you were here?”

“Yeah.”

“I knew you were our leader for a reason.”

“I’m…your leader?” Sungjin repeats, blinking.

“Unless memory lies.”

“I’ll take your word for it. I’ve gathered a few choice names in the last few days. If we get out of this alive, I’ll consider myself a true celebrity.”

“I look forward to it.” Jae’s laughter dies as he strums his guitar a few times. He nods and then glances at the rest of them, meeting each of their eyes until he finally gets to Brian. “I think I know the song you’re talking about, but you’re going to have to really lead us. My memory’s fuzzy.”

“Fine,” says Brian. He’s returned to his calm, mildly smirking self. “I’ve got this thing glued to the back of my head. I’ll run it through with you guys once, and then we can try to loop it on that device of yours.”

After a few runs of trial and error, Jae and Brian are finally able to guide Dowoon into the beginning of the song and, after a few strums of the three guitars present, Brian sings. Wonpil’s hands almost flatline on his keys when he hears the growling voice that stumbles for a moment and then sails out of his friend like a raging sea current. It’s the first time that he considers maybe—maybe—Jae’s right. Maybe this band thing really is true. Maybe he’s not dreaming. Maybe all of these illegal antics, which he’s been trying to fit into his cracking worldview, don’t even matter.

Maybe he’s a musician.

Maybe he…sings?

His body knows his part before he does, and before he realizes it he’s singing. And his voice is beautiful. He almost laughs at it—how could he not have known that he had this in him, that under all of the simulations and battle training and strategics classes and sparring he had a mockingbird in his throat? He wonders if it’s possible to get high on something like this, because he feels like he’s soaring. He’s found it. They asked him if his calling was simulation and he said yes, but he lied. He does simulations. He feels the keyboard under his fingers. He feels the song on his tongue.

If the climax of the song made him feel like he was soaring, the scream drops him straight into the earth. For a moment, he has no idea where he is, and then it hits him. Shit. He’s in the instrument room, and someone’s screaming, and—

Several things happen at once.

In the doorway, suddenly open, Alyssa falls as if lightning-struck.

Sungjin’s guitar screeches to a halt; footsteps pound on the ground.

“Is it recording? Did you record?” Brian is yelling.

“Yes” Jae is also yelling. “But I need to repeat it—I need to—!!”

Bullets. CC found an excuse to shoot. Wonpil ducks behind another pile—paintbrushes, an easel, someone’s harpsichord. The Dome didn’t just ban music; it banned art and creativity, as the opposite of war preparation. This room kept it all. A bullet buries itself in the harp and Wonpil scampers deeper into the room.

Someone grabs his arm and yells, “Who?!”

“Wonpil,” he hisses back.

“Brian’s friend?” demands Dowoon, still holding his arm.

“Yes! Where are they?”

Dowoon doesn’t answer and just shouts, “This way, come on!”

Wonpil stumble-runs behind Dowoon, who’s surprisingly strong, until the latter yelps and the two collide with another pile. Wonpil can’t believe how deep the room is, but he doesn’t have time to think about it much because Dowoon is groaning and—is he wounded?

“Are you alright?”

“I’m—ow! My leg—”

Wonpil pushes him farther behind the pile and leans him against an abandoned canvas. He rips a piece of his uniform off and wraps it around Dowoon’s leg; it immediately soaks up the blood. Wonpil curses under his breath and is about to sacrifice another scrap of his shirt when Sungjin runs up from behind him.

“Is he hurt?”

“His leg—”

“Got it,” Sungjin interrupts, slinging Dowoon over his shoulder with a grunt. He hoists him up and then, before he starts to run, taps Wonpil on the back.

“Find Jae,” he orders. “He’s gone off to destroy that damn black machine.”

“What?”

“The amplifier’s not blocking out the sound enough as it is. Jae’s trying to break the machine and stop it entirely, but it’s not worth it. Alyssa and Brian have gone after him to bring him back, but they’ve been taking too long—I’m afraid that thing’s screwing with their heads. You need to get them out now. We have to get out of here before someone sees us and gives Command an excuse to issue a death warrant.”

“But sir…isn’t Alyssa…”

“She’s wounded, but doing her job,” Sungjin snaps curtly, gesturing back towards the room’s entrance. “Go! I’ve got Dowoon. They want me, not you. As long as I’m on the loose, they won’t care about you. Bring as many of them back as you can.”

“But—”

“That’s an order, soldier.”

Wonpil splutters for a moment and then slumps his shoulders. “Right.”

“Okay.” Sungjin adjusts Dowoon’s position on his back and gestures again, this time more desperately. “Please! I’m trusting you.”

—

Wonpil has never run as fast as he does now. He can’t believe he’s running towards the bullets—no one in their right mind should be doing that, even in a war—but he doesn’t have the luxury of hiding behind piles of instruments or holding up a shield. He’s just got to outrun it all: the bullets, his fear, everything.

He skids to a halt only when he catches sight of what he’ll have to deal with: at least a dozen armed guards, all higher levs based on the patches on their uniforms. They’re circling the area, blocking off the entrance and calling out to one another. He shudders when he hears Sungjin’s name tossed from mouth to mouth like a species of vermin, something to be exterminated.

His eyes dart for some kind of weapon; Sungjin couldn’t have him wearing his handguns while he escorted him to his supposed punishment. He understood it then, but now he feels naked, weak, pitiful. His gaze then lands on a keyboard near him. It’s not really a keyboard but a keyboard guitar; nevertheless, something tells him that he knows how to play it. Not sure what he might do with his discovery but grateful for the comfort of something to hold, he grabs the instrument only to unearth a more encouraging tool.

It’s a looping pedal. He’s not sure how he recognizes it, but he does, which makes him think that he must have used one before too. He kneels and brushes his fingers against the buttons and cords, an idea slowly forming in his head.

He sets up against the wall, adjusting some of the piles so that they’re more difficult to maneuver. After a few checks on the functionality of the looping pedal, and his own proficiency at the keyboard guitar, he has everything plugged in and plays every simple tune he knows at maximum volume. The Dome anthem even gets thrown in there, because he has nothing better to try and at this volume it works just the same. He can already hear footsteps and shouts pounding towards him, but he steels his nerves and waits until they’re unbearably loud to slam his foot into the looping pedal and bolt.

He actually spots some of the guards rushing past him as he sprints for the entrance, but they’re so focused on the music emanating from farther inside the room that Wonpil is able to dart past them. He dives through the entrance and hurries down the hall towards the blue room.

He would have bounded past the door to the black machine, so tense on his own adrenaline, if not for the back of a fighting guard appearing out of nowhere. At first he’s confused, then shocked as he spots Alyssa’s ragged desk attendant’s attire dipping in and out from behind the guard’s bulky form. She’s holding her own to a certain extent, but Wonpil can see that she’s putting all of her effort into defending herself. Part of her orange tunic bleeds red.

Wonpil doesn’t even think about it. All he sees is the back of the guard to him, and all he knows is that the guard hasn’t seen him yet, and that this is his only chance. He takes the keyboard guitar, which he’s still got slung over his shoulder, and rams it with the force of every sparring lesson he’s ever taken into the side of the guard’s head.

“What—” Alyssa gasps as the guard falls.

“We’ve got to go,” Wonpil snaps, grabbing her arm. He tries to drag her towards the machine, but she stumbles and falls to her knees, holding the side of her chest.

“I can’t. I’m sorry.”

“What? What do you mean?”

“This isn’t a wound you recover from, trainee,” she says, lifting her blouse slightly. Wonpil winces; there’s even more blood than he thought, and none of it is dry. “Find Jae. Get him out of here.”

“Why…why did you do this for him? For us?”

Alyssa stares at him incredulously and then laughs before her face contorts with pain. “Trainee. I’m Officer Park’s guard. He ordered me to be here and so I have no business being anywhere else. And besides…” Her eyes darken. “He’s one of the few around here who actually cares about helping people. If he thinks this is the right thing to do, well then…it’s a worthy way to go out.”

“A nice speech, but worthless all the same,” a voice booms from behind them. Wonpil’s head shoots up and takes in the silhouette of the guard he had hit. The man is bruised, and Wonpil catches a slight limp in his gait, but he’s standing. And his expression is firm.

“Don’t,” Wonpil calls, raising his battered keyboard. “You’ve hurt her enough.”

“I’m not planning to hurt her anymore, trainee. I did not plan to hurt her this much.”

“Then…”

The guard’s expression softens and he extends an empty palm. “Officer Park has trapped you in his treasonous plans. You had no option but to follow him. I understand. If you agree to come back with us now and tell us where the officer has gone, we won’t punish you or any of your other unfortunate friends.”

“It’s not treason if it’s against a corrupt establishment like yours,” Alyssa spits.

“Silence, desk attendant. You are just as culpable as your beloved officer. There is no scenario in which you come out unscathed. The best thing for you is to let this young trainee go so that his head isn’t on you as well.”

“His head isn’t going anywhere. He’s one of us. Aren’t you, Wonpil?”

Wonpil hesitates, staring at the guard’s hand. He thinks about his little white bed and the plate of full rations that wait for him in the trainee quarters. He thinks about all of his simulation scores, which have been improving day by day. He thinks about how many hours he’s put into sparring and strategics and being the best soldier he can be. Treason pulled him out of his quiet life; the guard is offering to put him back in. No punishments, no consequences. Just a brush with the wrong crowd.

But then he thinks about Jae and his bright smile, his little squinty eyes and giddy, full-body laugh. He’s never seen anyone in the Dome laugh like that. He thinks of Brian, and how constant trips to the blue room beat fear into his friend and how hunger drove him into irritation, bitterness. He thinks of Dowoon, just a year younger than him but so eager to commit treason just to play the drums again, just to have a little taste of freedom. And he thinks of Sungjin, who’s sacrificed everything he’s achieved in this life because his people are suffering, and he can’t bear that.

Wonpil doesn’t need to remember his past to know that these people are his friends. He feels it. He knows it because Brian used to stay up until way after curfew with him at night, just talking, wandering through endless conversations just to prove to each other that they were human and that maybe sparring and sim numbers weren’t the only things that mattered. He knows it because he looked in Jae’s eyes and saw happiness there, and he’s beginning to think that it wasn’t just Jae’s happiness he felt, but the happiness that Jae gave him. He knows it because he recognizes a younger brother in Dowoon, a kindred spirit, one who yearns to be free and who is sure that he was once before.

And he follows Sungjin because Sungjin is his leader. In his past, sure, but more importantly, in his present.

“Sir,” Wonpil says, stepping forward with his hand tightening on his keyboard. “I’m sorry.” He reaches for the guard’s outstretched palm with one hand and then, as fast as he can manage, sends the keyboard whipping through the air into the guard’s neck. This time, he doesn’t think of sparring, but of long nights on the trainee quarter floors, of Brian laugh, of Jae’s squinty grin, of Dowoon’s embarrassed red ears, of Sungjin’s wide eyes, of pizza and fried chicken and movies and sneaking out.

He thinks of his friends, and he knocks the guard out cold.

When he turns back to Alyssa, she’s out too, barely breathing with her hands clutching her wound. He stands there for a moment, pulse racing, and then sprints towards the black machine. He’s got to save as many of them as he can.

He finds Brian first, curled on the ground in the center of the room with his hands over his head, rocking.

“No, no, no…”

“Brian—”

“Who’s that?” Brian demands as he whirls on Wonpil. “I’m—I don’t—aghh!!”

Wonpil kneels and gently pries Brian’s arms from his head.

“Hey,” he whispers, “you’re okay. I’ll take care of it.”

“You??” Brian demands with a hysterical laugh, his eyes wild. He squints at Wonpil and repeats himself. “You? Who are you?”

“I’m Wonpil. You’re Brian. You were here to get Jae out, but you shouldn’t have because you’re…”

“Afraid,” Brian breathes, tears welling up in his eyes. “So afraid. I don’t understand…”

“Hey. Look at me. I know you don’t know who I am, but I need you to trust me. I’m your friend, and you need to walk out that door, okay? You need to get away. You need to go down the hallway into the instrument room and find Sungjin, okay? You’ll remember once you get out. You just need to get out. Okay?”

“Get…out…”

“Yes, that’s right! You’ll find it really weird that I’m helping you once you’re out of here. You always say I’m the coward.”

“You’re my…friend…”

“Yeah.”

“And I’m the strong one of us…”

“Of course.”

“That…makes sense. I’m not…afraid…” Brian stumbles but rises to his feet with Wonpil’s help. Together, they trudge to the door. Brian blinks at Alyssa and the guard’s bodies and points at them.

“What…”

“I’m getting everyone out,” Wonpil assures him, imbuing every ounce of confidence he can fake into his voice. “I just need you to get out first. This place isn’t safe.”

Brian mumbles something under his breath, still teary, but manages to walk through the door on his own. Wonpil slams the door behind him and leans against it, heaving a relieved sigh. One down, two to go.

Jae made it significantly farther than Brian. He’s managed to yank a few gears and a dotted panel off of the black machine, but he’s no longer making progress. Wonpil finds him punching the machine with barely balled fists, muttering to himself.

“Jae…?”

He responds in his native language, the syllables tripping over each other. His smile falters and he suddenly looks lost, small, incredibly young. Wonpil grabs his hands and squeezes them gently to avoid the scratches on his knuckles.

“Hey…we need you to come back with us. You need to lead us out, but you’ve been here a while. We need to hurry.”

Jae just gapes at him, half a smile still hanging on his lips. Wonpil grits his teeth. He can feel the cloud in the back of his head spreading; soon they’ll be lost together. He’s got to help Jae remember something, anything, before it’s too late.

“Hey, hey, listen. Before we entered this place, there was that time when we were in…I think it might have been a dorm? You and I were fighting, yelling at each other, like really screaming, but neither of us are really fighters…and we started crying, remember? It explains why we both ended up being simulation players. We’re not good…”

Jae mumbles something in his native tongue. Wonpil leans in.

“What was that?”

“Fighters,” he whispers, in Korean this time. “We’re not good fighters.” His eyes clear for a second, but then start to roll back into his head. Wonpil tries to reel him back in.

“Yeah, we really aren’t. Whose idea was it to start this war, anyway? We need to get back to our old lives, whatever we had before this. It’s better for us. And plus, you said you didn’t like me. What kind of ending would this be for us, trapped in this shitty blue prison together, under this black machine?”

“This isn’t prison; it’s worse,” Jae mutters. “And I do like you.”

“Pretty sure you don’t.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because you’re making me spend all this time saving your ass.”

“Yeah? Well then why don’t you help me destroy this machine so we can all get out of here? Plus, where’s Brian? Wasn’t he here, too?”

“Brian?”

Jae’s eyes widen. He stares down at his bloody fists, then at Wonpil, then behind him at the wall. “Shit. Shit. We need to break this, and get out of here.”

“We need to get out of here first! We don’t have time!”

“We won’t have any time at all if these CC officers don’t keep turning this thing’s volume higher,” Jae growls. “That’s what I came here to stop. I remember now. You can’t stop the dial, so you gotta break it. And the dial’s inside the damn thing. Does—does that guard there have a gun?”

“Probably. I’ll check. We have to hurry, though.”

“Then go! And give me that keyboard.”

Wonpil runs to the guard and flips him over. Some pushing and pulling of the man’s uniform allows him to pull a handgun from under his tunic. He then runs back to Jae.

“Will this do?”

“Yes! Shoot!” Jae orders as he swings Wonpil’s keyboard guitar at the machine.

“But I’m not the best shot.”

“Your aim doesn’t have to be great. As long as we shoot it enough times it should do it.”

It’s kind of invigorating to pump bullets into a black wall and watch it crumple in on itself like great ship caving in on its hull. Wonpil imagines each bullet puncturing a cage on his memories, on the clouds in his brain that block him off from the life the Dome had stolen from him. And he’s not thinking of the glowing past that comes back to him in waves; he’s thinking of the lost potential of the years he spent wasting away in a simulation. If all of this never mattered, as he’s begun to believe, then the Dome would have stolen precious time that he could have spent with his family, his friends, his band. And he can never forgive it for that.

He feels the silence of the end before he hears it. Smoke billows out of the machine as its tired buzz trickles into a haphazard ticking, and then an inconstant pulse, and then, finally, nothing. It’s not true silence, of course, because the song on Jae’s recording can now be heard loud and clear, but Wonpil feels it in his chest: that emptiness, sweet and welcoming in the back of his head.

Jae lowers the keyboard before tossing the amplifier and his looped recording on the ground in front of the smoking remains of the sound machine. Wonpil lowers his gun and in that moment, they lose themselves in the song. Then the spell breaks, and they’re on the move again.

—

The Dome has always felt like the world to Wonpil, and so the sight of it from the outside is both underwhelming and impossible at the same time. He’s the last one to burst into the outside world from the vent that Jae led them through, and he nearly crashes into the rest of the group as they all turn to stare at their old home.

It’s barely the size of a nice hotel, but rounded in a way that makes it seem like a spaceship planted in the middle of the city. Now that his memories are seeping back into his head, Wonpil finds it strange that he ever just accepted the smallness of such a building as his entire universe. But then again, the place made him forget his friends, his family, and his passions. It was never something to underestimate, and still isn’t. Even though the air outside is still and humid, the earth seems to tremble under the chill of what they’ve done. Inside the Dome, people must be waking up, turning around, discovering that they were once different. Happier. Loved. How long will those doors hold them back?

“What do we do now?” Dowoon whispers, his arm draped over Sungjin’s back. He’s staring at the clouds in the sky; he hasn’t stopped since he stepped back into Seoul.

“We heal,” Sungjin replies, glancing at Alyssa, who’s unconscious and slung over Brian’s back. “We find our way back into society. And then, when the time comes, we help the rest.”

—

It’s been a year since the technological giant ALTec's Dome experiment was discovered and terminated. 5,000 people, both Korean and of other ethnicities, were rescued from the project and reintroduced to society. No one wanted to think about or face the fact that a company had managed to create a small regime of trained fighters with a pipe dream, so the incident appeared on the news once and then vanished.

People remember, though.

And thus, when the Korean band Day6 hosts a concert to raise money to help the survivors, the venue is packed. People are there when Brian clutches his microphone like a lifeline and weeps when the crowd chants his stage name. People are there when Jae bobs along to his guitar harder than ever just so that the crowd can’t see the tears in his eyes. Thousands cheer when Dowoon smiles at his drums and mouths all the lyrics; thousands cry when Sungjin has to turn around halfway through the chorus of “Letting Go.”

And thousands sing along when Wonpil sings “You’re Beautiful” at his keyboard, smiling with his eyes closed.

But only a small section of the crowd cries when the band dims the lights, unplugs all of its instruments, and sits at the edge of the stage. The members invite a young woman from their staff to sit on the stage next to them, and then turn off the lights entirely. That small section, along with the girl on stage, sings along in soft, sad tones as the five members transform the Dome’s cold anthem into a warbling lullaby, a reminder that it takes more than a pulse and a mission to be alive.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed the story!! Please leave a comment about what you thought & kudos if you can <3


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